#looking back its pretty neat that it ended up kind of aping the actual narrative of the hobbit.like almost everything is in proper sequence

[divorce-me]

oh hey i have an old google doc somewhere where i assigned all major arcana to the hobbit. hold on i'll find it

okay it's based mostly on the book. and it's only for the hobbit not lotr. and since there are no women in the hobbit book some of the more feminine tarot cards are creatively interpreted. but here are my old notes if it helps at all. meanings are listed as (upright; reverse)

the fool: bilbo (new beginnings; recklessness. major arcana is sometimes viewed as the fool's journey and this card is him at the very start of it i.e. bilbo running out of the shire eager for adventure but uncomprehending of the true danger that awaits him. hobbits leaving their home are really THE quintessential fool archetype)

the magician: gandalf (willpower/manifestation; trickery/illusions. the magician usually starts the fool on his journey. literallyyy gandalf. he walked into the shire that morning knowing full well he was going to fuck up bilbo's entire life. and he was delighted to do it too)

the high priestess: map and key to erebor (intuition; secrets. like the magician, the high priestess usually helps start the fool out on his journey. represents potential that needs to be acted on to be realized. the map and key are the whole instigation of the quest)

the empress: the shire (fertility/nature; dependence/smothering. the shire is both where bilbo longs to return to and where he cannot stay if he truly wants an adventure)

the emperor: thorin (authority/control; tyranny/rigidity. a delicate balance. one that thorin does not always handle with grace)

the hierophant: elrond (tradition/pursuit of knowledge; new approaches. elrond in his perfect little valley staying out of peoples business til they bring it to his doorstep. his reading of the moonrunes spurring the dwarves further on their journey)

the lovers: idk i never actually filled this one in. the meaning is (partnerships; disharmony). it doesn't have to be romantic necessarily. you could choose any pairing really. for the purposes of this hobbit oriented list i'd have to say it's either bilbo-thorin or better yet the company as a whole. they are quite the silly bunch after all, united in their goal but often at odds with one another.

the chariot: the eagles (control/willpower; lack of control/aggression. who knows when the eagles are going to deign to show up. sure they owe gandalf a couple of favors but they're giant predatory birds man. favorite part of the book is when the eagles save them and bilbo is like THEY are GOING to EAT ME. their control of the situation vs the lack of control for those they rescue)

strength: beorn (bravery/compassion; self-doubt/weakness. naturally strength is the huge werebear guy. he lets gandalf trick him into housing thirteen dwarves and a hobbit with only a little bit of eye-rolling on his part. cool dude)

the hermit: smeagol (contemplation/search for truth; isolation/loneliness/lost your way. riddles in the dark. what has it got in it's pocketses precious?)

the wheel of fortune: the one ring (change/inevitable fate; no control/bad luck. bilbo was fated to find the ring. in doing so he sealed both frodo's fate and all of middle earth's)

justice: thranduil (cause and effect/clarity/truth; unaccountability/unfairness. if you trespass in this guy's spooky forest you will be put in jail. if you are then asked to explain why you were trespassing in his spooky forest and are annoyingly evasive about it you will be put in jail for HUNDREDS OF YEARS. the prison food is good though)

the hanged man: bard (sacrifice/release; fear of sacrifice. bard wants nothing to do with the prophecy and knows the danger thorin and co pose when they come to laketown. when smaug attacks the guards fall back but bard holds fast and slays the dragon alone. fears the cost of war but will do what he needs to secure a future for his own people)

death: the lonely mountain and the desolation of smaug (end of a cycle/beginnings; holding on/stagnation. there's a lot wrapped up in erebor as a concept. it's the end of the company's journey and the beginning of their future. it's also their past and their doom)

temperance: the thrush (patience/finding meaning; extremes/lack of balance. stand by the grey stone when the thrush knocks on durin's day and a magic keyhole will appear. who hired this bird and why is it so committed to it's job. it's been 170 years)

the devil: smaug and the hoarded gold (excess/materialism/playfulness; freedom/release. smaug is greed incarnate. he leaves the mountain but the greed does not leave with him. freedom from greed can only be found when the treasure is shared)

the tower: burning of laketown (disaster/pride/upheaval; delaying or avoiding disaster. laketown sang of prophecy and gold when thorin and co arrived. that same prophecy is their downfall. perhaps it was inevitable. in the end the dragon is slain, even if it was at great cost)

the star: the arkenstone (hope/faith/rejuvenation; discouragement/faithlessness. the jewel of erebor. a representation of the days of old glory and the hopeful days of glory yet to come. used by bilbo to bring peace to a dire situation but only by betraying the faith thorin put in him not to do so)

the moon: roäc and the ravens of erebor (unconscious/intuition; confusion/misinterpretation. messenger ravens silhouetted by the moon? cool as hell)

the sun: dain (joy/success/celebration; negativity/sadness. the arrival of dain and his army from the iron hills was a great joy to the dwarves of erebor and an even greater boon in the war against the orcs and wargs. as king under the mountain he ushers in a new age of prosperity for erebor. but one remembers that it was only by way of tragedy he was granted kingship at all)

judgement: bilbo at thorin's deathbed. (reflection/reckoning; doubt/self-loathing. war comes at a cost even when it is in defense of something noble. thorin has clarity. his last words are kind. his home is restored; his nephews are dead. he judges this hobbit to be more worthy than all he has known before. he is forgiven)

the world: middle earth. specifically the path bilbo took to get there and back again. (fulfillment/completion; no closure/incomplete goals. bilbo's journey took him farther than he ever imagined. the quest for erebor is complete; the mountain is reclaimed; but the king does not live to see his home rebuilt; and a friend is lost forever)

I dont have much hope for this to get any attention, but i’m gonna (probably) start a series where i draw the hobbit/lotr characters in tarot cards and i need some help deciding what the characters would be-

so if you have any ideas for ANY character please interract!

[alex51324]

Hey so I'm obsessed with your write up of prehistoric humans and wonder if you have any reading recommendations for someone who wants to learn about this topic?

Sure!

So, the one I was reading recently, that I talked about on here somewhere, was called After The Ice: A Global Human History. It covers the period from about the end of the last ice age (about 20,000 years ago) to the beginning of recorded history (about 5000 years ago). The author uses this conceit (which I thought might be cheesy, but was actually kind of neat) where an imaginary narrator tours each continent, visiting various archeological sites at the time they were inhabited. It alternates between describing what was actually found at the sites, and narrative sections describing scenes that would account for the what was found however-many-thousand years later. (There's some educated guessing involved in those scenes, but the footnotes do a pretty good job of signposting how close to or distant from the evidence he is at any time.)

Another good one for the late-prehistory-to-early-history period is The Dawn of Everything, which has an ideological focus on demonstrating the non-inevitability of structural inequality as seen in feudalism and capitalism. It's not necessarily as careful as would be ideal about explaining how its conclusions about prehistoric human societies connect up with the archaeological evidence, but it has lots of big, interesting ideas.

If you want to go further back, the classic overview of human evolution that I read was Jared Diamond's The Third Chimpanzee. It's fairly old--1991--but it's a classic and still in print. There's quite a bit that's been discovered since then, but it's still a decent starting point.

Ian Tattersall's Understanding Human Evolution is a much more recent (2022) book that might be another good starting point.

Once you've got the big picture, there are a lot of good books about specific aspects. Lydia Pyne's Seven Skeletons looks at some of the most famous specimens in the study of human origins. Another one I read recently was Ancestral Appetites, which talks about food in the context of human evolution and prehistory, and Catching Fire: How Cooking Made Us Human, which is about the use of fire and cooking as a driver of human evolution.

Last Ape Standing looks at homo sapiens in the context of other extinct hominins, and Rebecca Wragg-Sykes's Kindred focused on the Neandertals.

Anyway, those are a few that came to mind! If there's another aspect you'd like to know more about, I can try to think of some more...I know I've read a bunch about the origins of language, but I'm drawing a complete blank on titles.

[britesparc]

Weekend Top Ten #495

Top Ten Non-MCU Post-Credit Scenes

Oh look, two MCU-related posts in a row! Delightful. Well, kinda. Because this week is a fake-out; it’s not really about the MCU! In fact, it’s almost anti-MCU! How wicked! Because ever since its inception, one of the quirks of the Marvel Cinematic Universe – something it’s become famous for, in fact – is its use of a post-credit scene. From the moment Nick Fury stepped out of the shadows to mention the “Avenger Initiative” after all the names had scrolled on by in Iron Man, the ongoing films were almost defined by their last-second teases and delights. You can tell, in the cinema, the fans and non-fans, as they get up and clear off, leaving the True Believers in their seats, wondering how these people could possibly vacate the theatre without really seeing the ending. In fact, as the franchise has gone on, the number of people staying put has – in my own rough reckoning – increased considerably, to now be about fifty percent of the audience. And why not? You’re really not getting the full picture! As these entangled narratives have unfurled before us, we like the connective tissue of the end-credit tease; the reveals of new characters or locations, the subtle hints at what’s to come. Loki has possessed Selvig! The Collector has the Aether! The ant’s playing the drums!

“To challenge them would be to court Death!”

Anyway, MCU films have post-credit scenes. But of course they’re not the only ones. Having a scene after the credits – or, sometimes, during the credits – is fairly common in the history of cinema. I think it’s become a lot more common this century, partly because of Marvel popularising it as a storytelling device or method of connecting disparate films in a franchise, but also (I believe) because CG animated films have often used it as a comedy trick. I’m not sure why or where this really began in earnest, but I think the old Pixar “out takes” was partly to blame, as was the whole “Shrek Dance Party” phenomenon. Anyway, as you will see, there are a few here that fit that bill.

Because that’s what this whole list is! It’s films that have great post-credit scenes, but aren’t Marvel! Or, at least, aren’t officially part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Some of them are classics of the form, thirty or forty years old; some are newer and fall into the categories I’ve mentioned above. Some follow a similar pattern to most MCU end-scenes – comedy skit or tease an upcoming movie, but stuck at the end of the credits – whereas some interfere with the credits throughout. I’ve been wary of scenes which aren’t really post-credit, but if we all the “mid-credit” scene in the MCU – or the multiple scenes from Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 – then we can allow some of the ones below.

So there we are! Nowt more to it. Let’s roll the credits...

Airplane! (1980): early in the film, our hero Ted Striker (Robert Hays) leaves his cab just as a fare gets in the back. Telling said fare to wait, Striker dashes after his girlfriend Elaine (Julie Hagarty), ends up on her plane, and, well, the rest of the delightfully silly and surreal plot unfolds. The film ends, the credits roll, and then we cut back to the abandoned cab, where the poor unfortubate fare is still sat in the back seat. “I’ll give him five more minutes,” he says, looking at his watch, “And that’s it.” I mean, it’s just sublime.

Deadpool (2016)/Deadpool 2 (2018): where to start? Whether it’s the first film’s Ferris Bueller-aping dressing gown skit (delightfully informing us that Cable will be in the next film) or the sequel’s multiple time-hopping gags – including undoing the film’s unfortunate fridging of Vanessa (Morena Baccarin) and killing Ryan Reynolds (“you’re welcome, Canada”) – this series really knows how to keep you engaged until the very last second. Can’t wait to see what he does when he’s part of the MCU.

Young Sherlock Holmes (1985): it’s funny, but looking back, I can probably trace any interest I have in Sherlock Holmes to this film and Basil the Great Mouse Detective. Anyway, this is a seminal film by any yardstick, featuring as it does one of (if not the) first example of a CGI character interacting in a real environment. But the end credit sting! The film’s Big Bad (Anthony Higgins), having somehow survived, checks himself into a hotel under the name of – you guessed it – Moriarty. This was, arguably, the first example of an end-credit scene teasing a future film! Setting up the Young Sherlock Holmes Extended Universe! Sadly it was a bit of a flop and they didn’t make any more.

Masters of the Universe (1987): Young Sherlock may have been interesting, but I’ll be honest, other people had to tell me who Moriarty was for me to understand the significance. The ending of Masters, however… well, it’s not quite as nuanced or revelatory, but the seemingly-dead Skeletor (Frank Langella) popping his head back up to yell at the camera “I’ll be back!” was a fantastic and exciting shock. We were guaranteed more He-Man! There’d be another film! There was not another film. Still cool, though.

A Bug’s Life (1998): I alluded to this earlier, and we’re only tenuously in “end-credit” land here (these scenes play over the credits, technically), but it still merits a mention. For A Bug’s Life was the film that began the (actually very short) Pixar tradition of showing us “outtakes” from the movie. And some of these first ones are among the best, with characters corpsing or forgetting their lines; subsequent films would lean more towards practical jokes and outright gaggery, whereas I personally prefer those that further the “it’s a movie being filmed” illusion. Anyway, the legend began here, not a sentence you can often say in relation to A Bug’s Life.

Frozen II (2019): in recent years Disney have made end-credit gags a tradition, and they’re pretty good at it. Moana’s fourth wall-breaking catchup with Tamatoa nearly made the list, but I’m giving the spot to Olaf. After recapping the plot of the first film earlier in the runtime, he’s now telling the story of the film you’ve just watched. The kicker? He’s telling the story to Marshmallow and the creepy little snow-brothers! From the first Frozen! And Frozen Fever! They’re at the ice palace, remember? It’s not only a funny bit, it’s also a nice nod to those kids (and their parents) who’ve mainlined anything Frozen-related for the past couple of years.

Winnie the Pooh (2011): a very underrated little gem, this; just so charming. One of the plot threads is the apparent disappearance of Christopher Robin, who leaves a note saying he’ll be “back soon”, but which is misread by stuffy know-it-all bird Owl, and leads to an amusing song of fright and alarm Pooh, Piglet and the gang all believe old Chrissie Rob has been abducted by a monster called a “Backson” (“They use their horns to put holes in your socks!”). Obviously this is a misunderstanding, it’s all resolved, happy endings all round. But then, at the end of the credits, who should rock up, but an actual Backson (who turns out to be very nice). What’s great about this, other than it just being a neat gag, is that it’s playing with the expectations of a young audience; it’s introducing them to a kind of comedic rug-pull. I can attest to the fact that nippers find it very entertaining.

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2019): I’m a bit concerned about being too superheroic (I nearly had the Flash/Superman race from Justice League in here, actually, which I like because it’s one of the few moments in either version of that film where the characters act like the characters I know). I’m also wary of leaning into the whole “sequel tease” thing. But hey, this one’s fun; it feels like a sequel tease, another alternate version of Spider-Man voiced by a famous actor. Then it warps into the classic sixties Spider-Man, and references the whole “pointing” meme to boot. It has its cake and eats it, and it’s great.

Gremlins 2: The New Batch (1990): the Gremlins films are great at breaking the fourth wall and poking fun at themselves, and this is no exception. The great Daffy Duck – who introduced the film, and whose anarchic style is a great precursor to the Gremlins themselves – pops up several times to comment on how long and boring the credits are, before finally asking the audience, “Don’t you people have homes?”. There should be more Daffy in movies.

Shrek 2 (2004): there were a few things I could have included in this list: Crank’s 16-bit game homage is quite fun; the Ferris Bueller bathrobe bit is iconic, although personally I find Ferris so unappealing as a character that I wouldn’t want to include it. So we have Shrek 2, one of the first of a whole raft of CG animated films to have a funny scene at the end. And the reason I’ve included it is because, well, it’s quite weird. Basically you find out that Donkey and Dragon have had babies that are, er, half donkey and half dragon (“Look at our little mutant babies!” says Donkey). I mean. There are connotations here that I’d rather not mull over.

So there we are. Now I didn’t want to include this as it’s not really a scene, and if I’m just doing “funny things in the credits” then we’re going to get onto stuff like the Naked Gun movies and all sorts of other weirdness, but I do want to shout out to An American Werewolf in London’s “any resemblance to persons living, dead, or undead” legal disclaimer at the end of the credits.